links for 2009-04-06

We've brought together key information you'll need to get started on your journey into Google Analytics. Whether you're a novice or expert at web analytics, take a moment to configure your account and learn about our extensive features. Use this checklist as a reference so your usage of Google Analytics grows with your business.

There are too many tools to review, with more coming out every day. My goal is to help you get started with the basics. Then you can use Twitter to help you find all the resources and tools that will make you a pro.

Nearly anyone who has watched TV in the last twenty years is familiar with The Simpsons intro, which always features a different brief segment at the end as the family rushes to sit together on their couch. Even after 436 episodes its a gag that still hasnt gotten old.

FriendFeed is releasing a newly redesigned version of its service today (its second major one since launching), and the emphasis is all about viewing both freshly posted items and user discussions as they happen. The service has had a real-time view since October of last year, but this update goes deeper than that, adding it to nearly every facet of the site.

With all the frustration lately about Twitter going down, disabling features, and developers leaving the service, people still keep coming back for some reason. Frankly, there just isnt anything that can fully replace Twitter. I think people have simply gotten so used to Twitter and have figured out their own ways to use the service, that moving to a new service and spending time adopting new ways of organizing communication is just too much for most people. Bring in FriendFeed – now, I know I have said previously that FriendFeed is not a competitor to Twitter, but they are getting closer and closer to being a reasonable alternative every day. At the same time, FriendFeed is just more stable and encourages conversation in ways that Twitter just cant (especially when @replies are down!). Id like to share with you a few ways that you can use FriendFeed to kick that Twitter habit, and utilize the full power of FriendFeed at the same time.

The deal, worth over $13 billion (10 billion euros) came about after the recent performance at the Pirate Bay trial gave strong indications that the judgment would go against Warner Bros. For the Hollywood movie studio, it seems that acquiring The Pirate Bay was the only option left.

In the press release, both groups gave a positive outlook to the deal. The Pirate Bay team has built an exciting and powerful media platform that complements Warner Bross mission to organize the worlds information and make it universally

Tomorrow friendfeed is coming out with a new version thats quite different from what it did before (I have a video of the meeting where friendfeeds co-founders demonstrate the new version to a bunch of bloggers including from VentureBeat, TechCrunch, and a variety of others. That set of videos will be up Monday morning at about 9 a.m. Pacific Time).

Seth Goldstein is the Principal Creative Director at Goldstein Media LLC. He has been in the Web design and Internet marketing business for more than 10 years. A self-proclaimed technologist, Seth is addicted to all types of technology. He loves to help businesses of all sizes figure out the best way to use the Internet to grow their business.